Hungarian book cover for William Gibson's Idoru

Book cover for William Gibson's Idoru, from this gallery of Hungarian book covers.

Link roundup

1. I saw this long William Gibson interview linked a few times today, not sure if I've read it before, or just read so much by him that it seemed familiar, but anyway, it's very interesting about his childhood. He's a great storyteller:

Wytheville was a small town. I wasn’t a very happy kid, but there were ­aspects of the town that delighted me. It was rather short on books, though. There was a rotating wire rack of paperbacks at the Greyhound station on Main Street, another one at a soda fountain, and another one at a drugstore. That was all the book retail anywhere in my hometown.

My parents were both from Wytheville. They eventually got together, though rather late for each of them. My father had been married previously, and my mother was probably regarded as a spinster. My mother’s family had been in Wytheville forever and was quite well-off and established, in a very small-town sort of way. My father’s father had moved down from Pennsylvania to start a lumber company. Once the railroads had gotten far enough back into the mountains, after the Civil War, there were a lot of fortunes being made extracting resources.

My mother had had some college, which was unusual for a young woman in that part of the world, but she hadn’t married, which was basically all a woman of her class was supposed to do. When she did eventually marry my father, he was the breadwinner. He had had some college, too, had studied engineering, which enabled him to wind up working postwar for a big construction company. My earliest memories are of moving from project to project, every year or so, as this company built Levittown-like suburbs in Tennessee and North Carolina.

2. Apparently I'm not the only person who thinks the new Google Reader design is inexplicably horrendous. It's so bad in such obvious ways that I wonder if it's a preliminary step toward eliminating the service.

3. Here's a talented artist looking for commissions to make custom action figures. (I post his work often at my custom toy site.)

Link roundup

1. William Gibson made the main character in Pattern Recognition afraid of Bibendum because his own daughter was terrified of him.

2. How to turn a dollar store skeleton mask into a Death Eater mask.

3. Suspected Russian spy trying to avoid getting deported from England:

Elements of the case . . . included her interest in Nato and a string of affairs with older men in positions of authority.

Via.

4. Book giveaway.

5. At Toycutter: Sucker Punch mecha Munny.

Link roundup

1. Part of a longer interview, William Gibson explains how he got published:

As soon as he got home he sent me a draft of a short story he had written perhaps an hour beforehand: “This is my new genius short story.” I read it—it was about someone who discovers there are things that live in bars, things that look like drunks and prostitutes but are actually something else—and I saw, as I thought at the time, its flaws. I sat down to write him a critique, but it would have been so much work to critique it that instead I took his story and rewrote it. It was really quick and painless. I sent it back to him, saying, “I hope this won’t piss you off, but it was actually much easier for me to rewrite this than to do a critique.” The next thing I get back is a note—“I sold it!” He had sold it to this hardcover horror anthology. I was like, Oh, shit. Now my name is on this weird story.

People kept doing that to me, and it’s really good that they did. I’d give various friends stuff to read, and they’d say, “What are you going to do with this?” And I’d say, “Nothing, it’s not nearly there yet.” Then they’d Xerox it and submit it on my behalf, to places I would have been terrified to submit to. It seemed unseemly to me to force this unfinished stuff on the world at large.

2. "How to Get iOS 5’s Biggest Features in Android Right Now ."

3. Kotaku and Destructoid gave Arkham City great reviews, but this was definitely my complaint about Arkham Asylum:

It's just confusing to have so many buttons doing so many things, and so many enemies that require so many different ways of dispatching. It's certainly great to have options and variety, but there's an information overload that can drown even the most focused of brains. This is an issue that doesn't just affect combat -- with so many gadgets, it's tough to keep track of which items perform which tasks, and when they're needed against certain obstacles. I was stuck at one point because I forgot that, among everything else he can do, Batman can slide to get under low barriers. It totally slipped my mind among all the things I needed to remember. This ties into the earlier criticism of Batman's grappling hook -- there are so many things to latch onto that the game itself gets confused.

4. Relatedly, Topless Robot is giving away Arkham City figures.

Link roundup

1. I can't believe so many longtime bloggers still don't know that infographics are created as linkspam to improve Google search results. (As I've mentioned before, I've been offered money to post them.)



2. BoingBoing interviewed William Gibson to celebrate the release of the Zero History paperback. Sample:

Do you have a "daily carry?" If so, what are the things in it?

A very thin, almost weightless wallet, made of a material called Kuben (which is sort of like Dyneema but less fancy-looking) deployed in front pocket. (I had a walletectomy for a back issue; back-pocket carry is murder on the back, plus much less secure.) A steel-cable Muji keyring with keys and a SwissTech Utili-Key 6-in-1 tool (which looks like a key). A Montblanc roller-pen from before they become a luxury brand (I found one on eBay after reading Hiroshi Fujiwara's fascinating book Personal Effects).


3. My understanding is that Mattel didn't sell remotely close to the minimum number of subscriptions that they supposedly needed to support a DC Universe club, but have nevertheless announced that they "found a way to make the program work."



4. Apparently the Deus Ex Human Revolution viral game is ongoing, but the moderators have had trouble finding an audience able/motivated enough to solve the puzzles.

There was a Neuromancer video game

Wikipedia:

Neuromancer is a computer adventure game created by Interplay Productions in 1988 and distributed by Mediagenic (a brand name that Activision was also known by). It was designed by Bruce Balfour, Michael Stackpole, Brian Fargo, and by Troy A. Miles, who was also responsible for the programming.



It is based loosely on the William Gibson novel of the same name and takes place in both the "real world" and the extensively realized and detailed world of cyberspace. It is also noted for having a soundtrack based on the Devo song "Some Things Never Change". The gaming rights at the time were owned by Timothy Leary, who brought the project to Interplay to develop.

You might be able to download it here.

Link roundup

1. New movie Spider-Man paper toy available for download.



2. The latest video for The Old Republic shows off something called huttball. I lost interest halfway through.



3. The BBC's reading of William Gibson's Pattern Recognition is now complete. (One of my favorite books.)

T-shirts based on William Gibson's novels

T-shirts based on William Gibson's novels. Via.

Link roundup

1. First part of a new audio performance of William Gibson's Pattern Recognition. Gibson also has an article in Scientific American, but it's gated.



2. "India has arrested an anti-corruption activist for — conspiring to fast without permission."



3. Comic Book Resources interviewed Chip Kidd, who accuses Mike Mignola of false modesty at 15:05. (This is the video mentioned, showing off his apartment.)



4. Laika art challenge.

Young William Gibson

Young William Gibson and wife, I believe.

*Previously: German book covers for William Gibson novels.

Link roundup

1. ESPN's 2011 all-overrated MLB team.

2. William Gibson loves the Dyson air multiplier:

Just saw/experienced the Dyson Air Multiplier. FAR more amazing than the Dyson Air Blade.

With the Air Blade, you can imagine how it works. air Multiplier is Arthur C. Clarke's definition of magic. Seriously. 22nd Century tech.

And they look like very large, utterly minimalist pieces of extremely high-end Scandinavian jewellery. And the breeze feels like one.

Love it when a moment of feeling like an immigrant to a new century is so utterly positive.

$300+ at Amazon. Here's an explanation for how they work - - they use something called "process entrainment."

3. It's fascinating reading Susannah Breslin's blog at Forbes (which is about her struggles moving from one job to another, and how to be a successful blogger in general). I don't think she's been blogging there for more than two months, and already she's written a post that is more or less about how she's making choices that will sabotage her continued employment there.

Czech covers for William Gibson novels

Czech covers for William Gibson novels.

German book covers for William Gibson novels

German book covers for Wiliam Gibson novels.

I like Calvin and Hobbes even more now that I realize the dad is William Gibson

Via William Gibson.

I like Calvin and Hobbes even more now that I realize the dad is William Gibson

Via William Gibson.

Link roundup

1. William Gibson wrote the X-Files episodes Kill Switch and First Person Shooter.

2. How to improve home wifi coverage.

3. The new Nintendo game Kirby's Epic Yarn was supposed to star a new character until the creators were forced to replace the star with Kirby.

*Buy X-Files DVDs at Amazon.

Link roundup

1. Hour and half mp3 of Cory Doctorow interviewing William Gibson and taking questions from an audience.

2. Chris Battle posted some new Power Puff Girls drawings in his Etsy shop.

3. Official site for the Spider-Man musical.

*Buy Powerpuff Girls at eBay.

Link roundup

1. Dirpy turns youtube videos into mp3s. Via.

2. William Gibson:

RT @jrronimo: @GreatDismal Is it true that, after Neuromancer, you bought your first computer and were annoyed by it's fan noise? [Yes]

3. A middle school in Nettleton, Mississippi is apparently segregating student body positions by race.

*Preorder Zero History for 40% off at Amazon.

Teasers from William Gibson's Zero History

Last year, William Gibson posted teasers for his upcoming book Zero History. These snippets may or may not be in the book, but they certainly indicate that it's a continuation of the story from Pattern Recognition and Spook County.

CRICKET

The room-phone began to ring. It was a collage, something else Inchmale dubbed steampunk. A massive, nautical-looking handset of rubber-coated bronze rested in a leather-padded cradle atop a cubical box of brass-cornered rosewood. Its ring was mechanical, and tiny, as though you were hearing an old-fashioned bicycle-bell, far off down a quiet street. She stared hard, willing it to silence.

"Intense hysteria," she said.

It continued to ring.

Three steps and her hand was on was it.

The handset was as absurdly heavy as ever.

"Coprophagia." Briskly, as if announcing a busy department.

"Hollis," he said, "hello."

She looked down at the handset, heavy as an old hammer and nearly as battered. Its thick cord, luxuriously cased in woven burgundy silk, resting against her bare forearm.

"Hollis?"

"Hello, Hubertus."

She pictured herself driving the handset through brittle antique rosewood, crushing the aged electro-mechanical cricket within. Too late now; it had already fallen quiet.

"I saw Reg," he said.

"I know."

"I told him to ask you to call."

"I didn't," she said.

"Good to hear your voice," he said.

"It's late."

"A good night's sleep, then," heartily. "I'll be by in the morning, for breakfast. We�re driving back tonight. Pamela and I."

"Where are you?"

"Manchester."

She saw herself taking an early cab to Paddington, the street in front of Cabinet utterly deserted. Catching the Heathrow Express. Flying somewhere. Another phone ringing, in another room. His voice.

"Manchester?"

"Norwegian black metal," he said, flatly. She imagined Scandinavian folk-jewelry, then self-corrected: the musical genre. "Reg said I might find it interesting."

Good for him, she thought. Inchmale's sub-clinical level of sadism sometimes found a deserving target.

"I was planning on sleeping in," she said, if only to be difficult. She knew now that it was going to be impossible to avoid him.

"Eleven then," he said. "Looking forward to it."

"Goodnight. Hubertus."

"Goodnight." He hung up.

She put the handset down. Careful of the hidden cricket. Not its fault.

Nor hers.

Nor even his, whatever he was.

COLD-FX

GABBLE RATCHETS

AMATEUR

BOHEMIAN

MR. FISH

FIFTEEN

THE GABRIEL HOUNDS

HOLD THE COPROPHAGIA

CABINET (HAPPY NEW YEAR)

*Previously: Here's what the footage from Pattern Recognition looked like.

*Zero History is 34% off at Amazon.

William Gibson's next book Zero History available for preorder

William Gibson's next book Zero History is available for preorder at Amazon. Via.